Category Archives for Airlines.
Allegiant is an ultra low cost carrier with a bit of a different business model than Spirit or Frontier. They take Hall of Fame right fielder Wee Willie Keeler’s admonition to “hit ’em where they ain’t” seriously. If you need to fly from Mesa, Arizona to Pasco, Washington at 1 p.m. on a Tuesday they’re your airline. They’re cheap and they fly non-daily leisure routes no one else does.
Minneapolis-based Sun Country which has transformed itself into a low cost carrier — they even shut down the elite portion of their frequent flyer program — has stranded hundreds of passengers in Mexico.
They offer seasonal service to various cities and because of weather at their home in Minneapolis they cancelled flights from Mazatlan and San Jose del Cabo. And since it was the end of their season they aren’t going to send planes to pick up the passengers later.
The major US airlines offer premium meet and greet services. You can be escorted through check-in and security and from lounge to gate, and you can be met on arrival for connections or escorted to baggage claim.
Amenity kits are about providing something useful to make the flight more comfortable. Amenity kits are a takeaway, a premium reminder of the airline and the experience. Amenity kits are advertising to the customer about a brand. The bath amenities I use at home are ones I first discovered at a hotel.
There was a time that Delta was an also-ran. American Airlines was the leader in the industry, the brightest minds started at American and learned their craft and then went on to run other airlines. Even a mere decade ago it seemed United did its best to copy American, at least with frequent flyer promotions.
Now the unquestioned leader in the US airline industry is Delta. They’re the most profitable and delivering better operational reliability than their largest counterparts. And everyone just assumes they’re smarter.
With tensions running high is appears that several US airline commercial flights are already avoiding Russian airspace.
Today’s American Airlines Dallas – Beijing flight AA263 routed out to Los Angeles and made a stop before being scheduled to continue to China. American Airlines AA125 from Dallas to Hong Kong diverted to Los Angeles as well. So did American Airlines AA187 from Chicago to Beijing.
A veteran gate agent in Miami asked American Airlines CEO Doug Parker at last week’s employee town hall about the user interface Qik that she’s required to use — instead of working directly in Sabre like she used to — and she calls it “a Pinto car… it does not perform to the standard we’re used to. Qik is not efficient” and she says in Miami they call it “despacito Qik.”
The latest American Airlines employee podcast interviews Holly Hegeman. She talks about how she got involved covering the airline industry, doing consulting for Bob Crandall and doing the airline’s annual report with him.
I’m pretty sure I found Flyertalk.com in 2001 from a link on Holly’s PlaneBusiness website so in some sense I owe the start of my journey — which began reading Thomas Petzinger’s Hard Landing over 20 years ago and by traveling as a newly minted frequent flyer and that was accelerated through my association with Randy Petersen — to Holly.
This past week American Airlines CEO Doug Parker held an employee question and answer forum in Miami. A pilot there expressed his frustration at delays, saying that they’re measured in “dog minutes” because each minute feels like seven. They finally get on their way and arrive at their destination only to find that they have no gate.
Parker offered an explanation for how and why they run into a lack of gates.
This ultimately amounts to three years of vitriol for nothing. It lets the US airlines claim they got something (of little value) while allowing the targeted Gulf carriers to go on about their business.
Gary Leff is one of the foremost experts in the field of miles, points, and frequent business travel -- a topic he has covered since 2002.
Co-founder of frequent flyer community InsideFlyer.com, emcee of the Freddie Awards, and named one of the "World's Top Travel Experts" by Conde' Nast Traveler (2010-Present) Gary has been a guest on most major news media, profiled in several top print publications, and published broadly on the topic of consumer loyalty. More About Gary »
